A communications channel refers to the medium used to convey information from a sender to a receiver. Communications channels include voice and data channels. A receiver may have to authenticate to a sender to access the communications channel. An authentication procedure (e.g., involving a user name, password, a pass phrase, a personal identification number (PIN), etc.) may establish the identity of the receiver with some degree of confidence, and the sender may grant access privileges to that identity.
If a receiver is authenticated to the sender by a first communications channel and would like to engage a second communications channel to access the sender, the receiver has to separately authenticate to the sender via the second communications channel. This is burdensome and time-consuming to both the sender and the receiver.